Kingsford: Henry Ford's Charcoal Town

Every bag of Kingsford charcoal you have ever tossed on a backyard grill traces back to this small Upper Peninsula city. In the early nineteen twenties, Henry Ford needed three hundred thirteen thousand acres of Michigan timber to build the wooden frames and dashboards of the Model T. His cousin-in-law, Iron Mountain real estate agent Edward G. Kingsford, brokered the deal and helped Ford build a massive sawmill and auto-parts plant here.

The mill generated mountains of scrap wood. Ford's chemists figured out how to press the waste into compact charcoal briquettes, and in nineteen twenty the Ford Charcoal Briquette was born. The surrounding neighborhood incorporated as the Village of Kingsford in nineteen twenty-four. After Ford sold the brand, it kept the Kingsford name in Edward's honor. Today Kingsford commands eighty percent of the American charcoal market.